Myst - Place and Stages

Some friends, the ones who got me to play Dark Souls, have convinced me to play Myst.  They said it'd be less than 10 hours, and they said it was good.  Now, I had heard of Myst, and I heard good things about it, but it never piqued my interest.  I was never one for esoteric adventure games growing up, and never grew into it. 

I beat the game through two sessions, the first, a 6.5 hour stream, then a 3ish hour one. 

The game wasn't quite what I expected, but I also didn't know what exactly TO expect.  I knew it was an environmental puzzle/adventure game with a heavy focus on place, and that's what I got... but not in the way I expected.

It's complicated, OK?

I liked Myst, even though I hit a few snags that really walled me.  I spent way too many hours misreading the first damn clue in the game the wrong way.  I did not find the chamber with the Imager until I was 9 hours in, had seen two endings, and was looking for the "good" ending.  I am not observant.

I want to start with the things I didn't like about the game.  Navigation can be finicky, as it's done by clicking towards where you want to go.  Since this is an older game that has an almost slideshow like way of navigation, where you end up can look different than where you thought you'd end up.  This is especially a problem in my least favorite area of the game: Channelwood.   Channelwood is a navigational nightmare.  When moving between the treetop platforms, due to the obstructed view by the ropes, led me to wandering in circles unintentionally.  By far, my least favorite zone in the game.  The puzzle there was fairly straightforward at least.

That's... about it?  The other parts that gave me trouble were me misreading things and following a bad hypothesis and thought pattern.  It's my fault that I kept revisiting the planetarium over and over, thinking it was a different room.  I also hate myself for not FUCKING TAKING A PICTURE OF THE TORN NOTE IN CHANNELWOOD.  God.  I found the other half in Stoneship, and wanted to put them together, but forgot I literally said "I'm not going to take a picture of this".  I tried to go back to Channelwood to find it, but after a half hour of getting turned around again, I said fuck it.  The completed note is the only thing I looked up online.

I did receive a few hints from chat during the game, in the form of "Stop going in that room" or "Double check a place you've walked by a few times recently" and "How many pages have you found again?"

Let's be positive for a change!  The mechaniations of the game were pretty neat!  Figuring out the tower and finding the hints to the different ages was really interesting!  The first two-thirds of the Selenitic Age were good (bad railway section tanked the end of it)! Mechanical had a really neat flavor and central mechanic!  Managing the flow of water in Channelwood is the best part of that level.  Stoneship should have been the shortest but I'm an idiot!  Wait.

The main thing though, is the themes and aesthetics.  Everything is thematically tight.  Each area feels like it could be part of the same overarching world.  While the terrains may and technologies may vary, they all carry a similar look and feel.  You can see similarities in some of the coins and bottles in Stoneship and Mechanical.  This strong aesthetic ties and carries the whole game.  The puzzles are interesting, and the plot is threadbare, but you want to see what each area has to offer, because it's like you're on a globetrotting adventure. 

This, though, can feel like like different levels.  It feels like there's a real aversion to having levels, as in "individually packaged areas" in gaming today.  There are games now that like to have these unified worlds that's all interconnected.  Open world games in the vein of an Assassin Creed or Grand Theft Auto seem a lot more common, going so far as to even affect the long-standing Mario series, who has, for the longest time, focused on individual levels.  In Mario Odyssey, there are separate worlds, but I would hesitate to call them "Levels" in the classical sense.  In New Donk City, for example, you are let loose into a wide expansive urban playground, where you can jump, climb, and explore to find various Power Moons and find secrets.  There's something about the content density and size that keeps me from calling the different worlds in Mario Odyssey levels, like I would for the different areas in Myst. 

I am unsure if levels were used due to hardware limitations, or if they were a design aesthetic that has just passed, but there is something about not putting all of your game front and center.  THe implied boundaries of a level and area feel like they can give a sense of "what lies beyond" that open world games tend to lack.  For example, in Breath of the Wild, you get this big world map.  You can find desserts, mountains, tundra, tropical beaches, and grassy plains.  While Breath of the Wild is a large game, in terms of square milage, but I always feel weird in games where I can travel, by foot or vehicle from deserts to ice regions in like, a half hour.  Might be something in my brain that is bad with distances, since I don't travel or drive.  Distinct worlds let me imagine that there is a vast amount of space between the areas and oh my god I just rememberd that Mario Odyssey has you flying around the world in your ship whischis LITERALLY what I was describing. 

I WAS WRONG ABOUT MARIO ODYSSEY OK.

I don't want to go fix the error.  I had forgotten how the world was laid out until just now, and I"m typing stream of conscious.  So yes, Mario Odyssey, good levels.  Good separation between areas, so it feels like there's some actual depth to the world and makes you wonder what other sorts of Kingdoms fill in the gaps between the areas you visit. 

Back to Myst.  Good game, considering playing more games in the series.  Who knows, maybe I'll jump to Riven in a few weeks.

For now, I'm glad I hit Myst.  Hitting these touchstone games can be pretty enlightening and can give me new contexts for viewing current games. 

Going to start ending posts with a random song suggest.  Today's is "Pirates" by Bullets and Octane

Reflections (Dark Souls 8)

Progress report: I have entered Anor Londo and beat two of the lightning breathing Gargoyles.

I'm feeling less conflicted about how I feel about Dark Souls, but I think I'm starting to figure it out.  This game is working for me because of the community around it.  Not the Dark Souls Community writ large, but the small group of people I've been able to talk to about this game and who watch the streams.  If I were playing this offline on my own, I would have looked up a guide or just straight up stopped playing by now.

And I think I get it.  When this game released years ago, there was a rush of excitement and overall community surrounding it.  Surrounding the mystery and wonder of exploring the unknown and cryptic world outlined.  The difficulty and communal discovery lends itself towards building a group of people to talk with, and that is worth praising.   You see these cottage communities pop up around certain games.  For me, Undertale was that game, where I would play through then wait to talk about it with other friends after they experienced it.  As someone who had That Game before Dark Souls, I can start to see and appreciate the picture of this game.

So real quick, I want to thank anyone whose read these posts, stopped in the discord channels, or stopped by the stream.  It's been a pleasure to discover this game with you, and I am humbled that you have shared in any success I have had.  The various clips and highlights you guys have made have warmed my heart.

Now, to talk more directly about the game.  Sen's Fortress.  Where to start where to start.  Based on my playstyle, it took me a long-ass time to find a strategy that worked for the opening room.  Normally, I try to take control of a situation, but for some reason the two Snake Sworders kept me on my back foot for a long time.  After that, I could regularly push to new areas and path, but the opening gave me trouble until o figured some things out.  Aural Decoy, which is just "Distraction!" the spell, did so much heavy lifting for me.  I thought the spell would be situationally useful, so I equipped it on a lark.  Turns out the situation was "almost all of them".

It took me some time to finally clear the boss.  The other day, when exploring the outer parts of the Fortress, I had a harrowing exchange with the Archer as I was out of estus and and resorted to Humanity healing.  I also ended up getting too cute with my usage of Aural Decoy at times, as I would sit and cast it instead of dodging or just trying to block into a Soul Arrow cast.  What's nice though is that after I came back from a few days break, the most recent stream had really good runs.  After a few days off I tend to internalize things I guess, and just play better.  Don't know why.

 I'm enjoying the game, on its own merit and the community aspect of it, mentioned above.  How's that for progress?

Anthem Early Impressions

I picked up Anthem today, because I've missed out on previous Live Service games at launch and thought it would be interesting to track one.  I played the tutorial message and I'll start with early thoughts in bulleted form, so I can review these as time goes by, seeing how the game changes.

First things first.  The game gives you an options menu the first time you start it.  I like this.  Lets you configure your game before throwing you in.  Some games like to just toss you in and don't let you enable subtitles for until you can access the in game menu.

HOWEVER... The Subtitle option is weird.  It default to what it calls "Medium" subtitles, but these feel like 8 pt font, which doesn't feel very "medium" to me.  I'll be bumping that up to large soon.

The game introduces controls in a... Hm.  Not sure if it's interesting or not.  "It starts by saying I'll be bringing your systems online one at a time", but really, you can start shooting and using abilities pretty early, before their control is explained.  It also didn't explain that the left stick handles movements and the right stick handling camera controls.  Not sure it's an assumption that people have played modern games, or that they expect people to not want to use the D-Pad to move.  Also, your Ultimate ability is tied to D-pad up, so there's that as well.

Flying and hovering feel good.  After the introductory flashback, the lush jungle you get to fly around is pretty.  The first gun on my Javelin, the robit pilot, doesn't carry the same weight as some other guns in games.  I'm not sure if the audio design for the gun or the impact sound of the rounds is what's making it feel off, but it doesn't sound like a gun a exosuit would use.

I am not sure how I feel about 'Pick up these key fragments to open the door" sections.  There have been two in the first 40 minutes.  Feels like it's an excuse to fly around more, but if you can't always see the fragments, it can be a pain.

All things considered, I can see a framework.  I'm not too deep into the game, only did the first automatic mission.  I haven't been able to walk around the fort, nor have I gotten to any of the loot gathering of the game.  I'll check back in after I play some more.